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"My work schedule has changed over the years. The one constant is, when at work on a novel, I try to work seven days a week, so as not to lose touch with that world. Within that, I'm flexible on hours and output."
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"The job description, like most, used complicated words that made job-hopefuls hesitant to apply because it may be out of their range of capability."

"When employees are motivated and love what they do you will see higher productivity, less turnover, healthier communication, increased loyalty, and a happier environment."

"We are so used to working that not working is the new hard work."

"The office' is a cemetery of dreams."

"Speaking about work isn't working."

"I didn't want to give up my job and join the ranks of the Doing Fuck All brigade no matter how much money I had in the bank."

"Extreme night shift work in high altitude astronomy is easily avoidable by using a split night shift where the first night shift starts before sunset and finishes at midnight and the second night shift starts with a new fresh person working through to after sunrise."

"The summit of Mauna Kea was definitely a place where it was better to be a hard to replace skilled engineer than an easy to replace technician. It was my experience that once you had developed Mauna Kea Sickness that the management team would blatantly harass you out of your job using nasty inhumane human resources techniques."
Explore more quotes by Donald E. Westlake

"I loved it, but social reality impeded. Now I wander in here at 9 in the morning or so, and come back for a while in the afternoon. I am a very lenient boss."

"I also wanted Parker to operate in the Internet age without losing being Parker. He's always operated in the world without really being with the world, and cyberspace means that the rest of us are more and more living the same way."

"I start with the story, almost in the old campfire sense, and the story leads to both the characters, which actors should best be cast in this story, and the language. The choice of words, more than anything else, creates the feeling that the story gives off."

"All of the changes in publishing since 1960 are significant. There are far fewer publishers."

"If it weren't for received ideas, the publishing industry wouldn't have any ideas at all."

"If you think of movie studio executives, say, as society, then I root for the independent producers."

"When Stark isn't off sulking somewhere, or whatever he's doing when he won't return my calls, I alternate between the two. That usually works well, though occasionally an idea for the wrong guy drifts through my mind."

"Seem to be telling this, but really telling that. Three-dimensional writing, like three-dimensional chess. Nabokov was the other master of that. You could learn something from Nabokov on every page he ever wrote."
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